We’ll be having dropin meetings as usual on Tuesdays at 7:45 PM
at my place.
Other events
Our playing at the Boston Wort
Processors Pignic was well-received. Ishmael, Jan, and I
played Susato, country dances, Ortiz and van Eyck.
The Wakefield Summer Band, with Laura Conrad on tuba, will be
playing its first concert this Friday, July 1, at 7 PM at the
bandstand on the Wakefield Common, as the sun sets over Lake
Quannapowitt. Come kick off the Fourth of July weekend with
marches, polkas, and concert staples. Other concerts this season
are scheduled for July 22, August 12, and August 26.
We will resume our regular dropin meetings the following week,
and will be meeting on Tuesdays at 7:45 PM at my place.
Other events
Anne forgot to mention the following on Tuesday, and asked me
to pass it on:
Convivium Musicum will be singing the BU Marsh Chapel service this Sunday.
This is always just an hour between 11AM & noon, always broadcast live on
WBUR, 90.9FM. We will sing the service music which includes pieces by
Charles Villiers Stanford & John Rutter, a famous shape note tune arr. by
Alice Parker, a Monteverdi Kyrie, Richard Farrant’s “Call to Remembrance”,
& two Victoria & Guerrero motets from our current “Armada” concert.
Of course there are more events than anyone is going to be able
to go to next week. I have written up some of my suggestions on my
blog.
If anyone wants to blog about their own experiences at BEMF,
they can either have an account on laymusic.org and write posts
directly, or comment on my posts, or email me your comments and I
will post them and credit you as the author.
Next week we expect to finish playing through both the Holborn
(about 5 more) and the Morley Canzonets for three voices (2
more). If you have a copy of Holborne and are coming, please
remember to bring it. I am attempting to print another guest copy
(last week we needed two and had one, although there were no real
guests), but I may not manage it.
After that, I don’t know of any reason to not have regular
dropin rehearsals for a while on Tuesdays at 7:45 PM at my place.
There’s a performance opportunity at the Boston Wort Processors Pig Roast on
Sunday, June 26. The festivities start at 1 or 2 PM, so we’d
probably play mid to late afternoon. Let me know if you want to
come — I’ll have to sign you up as my guest a few days before the
event.
We’ve talked about having a party some time after BEMF, so we
can advertise it on the back of the flyer. I haven’t heard a lot
of people say they want to do this, or tell me when they can. If
I still haven’t heard more enthusiasm by the end of this week, I
won’t bother scheduling it.
As far as I know, we’ll be having dropin meetings on Tuesdays
as usual (7:45 PM, my place) until the week of BEMF (June 14), when we will not be
meeting.
Plans for the near future
We have finished with the Hoffman for the time being.
We have only about 8 more Holbornes to read through, and 2 or
three Morleys. So we may well finish the “helping Laura publish”
mission for this Spring, and be able to get back to playing
whatever we want. Although I’ll soon be doing more transcribing
for John Tyson’s improv class, which we’ll want to play.
As far as I know, we’ll be having dropin meetings on Tuesdays
as usual (7:45 PM, my place) until the week of BEMF (June 14), when we will not be
meeting.
Plans for next week
We didn’t get far enough to make a recording last night in 45
minutes, so we will have another session on the Gilgamesh
Cantata. Let me know if you’re interested in coming and I can send you
your part, and a pointer to the recording of what we did last
night.
We still have lots of Holborne we haven’t played yet, so we
will be doing some of that, too.
Other events
On Saturday, May 21, the John Tyson student recital will happen
at 2 PM in Lindsay Chapel, First
Church of Cambridge,, 11 Garden St. I’m going to be
playing ricercadas by Diego
Ortiz, accompanied by internationally reknowned clavichord
player Judith
Conrad on Baby.
I will again be blogging from the Boston Early Music Festival.
Last time, one of the most popular posts
was one I did before the festival, listing concert dates and
times of the fringe events our friends were playing in.
So please send me information about any event you think the
people on this list should know about. It’s a fair amount of
work putting together a post like this, so it helps me if you
send a brief description including all of who, what, when,
where, why, and links to anywhere more information is available,
such as the website of the group, or directions to the venu.
As far as I know, we’ll be having dropin meetings on Tuesdays
as usual (7:45 PM, my place) until the week of BEMF (June 14), when we will not be
meeting.
Plans for next week
Curt Hoffman is writing a cantata for unaccompanied chorus
based on The Epic of Gilgamesh. We’ve agreed to sing a movement of
it next Tuesday, for an informal recording to be played at a
conference next month. This means that if you don’t like singing,
you’ll have to sit out the actual recording, although we may as
usual use instruments while we’re sightreading the piece.
If you think you’d enjoy this more if you had a chance to look
at the piece beforehand, I have parts I can send you by email in
PDF form.
Holborne Orgy
I have so far been unable to convince 5 people who are solid
enough readers to hold down a part to commit to a party on
Memorial Day weekend. I don’t know what they think could possibly
be more exciting than a Holborne party, but they are clearly
waiting for a better offer.
So unless this situation changes, I will attempt to finish the
proofreading of the Holborne book over the course of the next four
Tuesdays. I’d appreciate it if the people who can sightread
Holborne would make an extra effort to attend these meetings, and
to arrive at something like the scheduled start time (7:45
pm).
Left to right: Ishmael Stefanov, Bea McClain, Norah Burch, Barney Gage, Anne Kazlauskas, Bruce Randall, Laura Conrad, John Maloney. Photo by Ishmael Stefanov
Walk for Hunger
I think we all had fun. All the Ravenscroft rehearsing we
did for NEFFA made it a lot more relaxed than usual, even though
we were also playing difficult Holborne on difficult
instruments.
The new venue for afterwards, the Deluxe Town
Diner in Watertown was good, too.
As far as I know, we’ll be having dropin meetings on Tuesdays
as usual (7:45 PM, my place) until the week of BEMF, when we will not be
meeting.
Social events
Holborne Orgy
I’d like to get the complete Holborne book up for sale before
BEMF, and I’d like to get it all well proofread before I do
that. I was thinking one way to do this would be to throw a
party with lots of people, some of whom could play from
facsimile and some from the Serpent Publications Edition.
It would be like the Christmas party, except with Holborne
instead of Christmas music. And if the weather were to get good
between now and then,
we could do some of the eating and drinking outside.
The
only obvious time before BEMF to schedule this party would be
Memorial Day weekend (May 28, 29, or 30). Of course, this won’t
work if everybody who would want to come will be out of town.
So if this sounds like fun, let me know whether you could come
that weekend, and which days are better for you.
Post-BEMF party
Two years ago, we included a party invitation on the back of
the flyers we passed out at BEMF. We didn’t actually get anyone
we didn’t already know to come to that party, but I think it did
cause the flyer to give a better idea of what kind of group we
are, and a couple of people did join on the basis of that
flyer. So if you’d like to come to a Cantabile party after BEMF, please
let me know which weekend days in late June and early July would
be best for you.
If you’re at NEFFA this
evening (Saturday, April 16, 2011), you should come to the Ravenscroft
Workshop in the Middle School Room 108 at 9 PM. If you
weren’t planning to go, you should think about coming
anyway.
This Tuesday, April 19, and the following Tuesday, April 26,
the meeting is limited to people who are going to be performing
at the Walk for
Hunger. If you’re a dropin member of the group, we look
forward to seeing you again in May.
Dropin meetings on Tuesday at 7:45 PM at my place
until:
NEFFA worshop, 9 PM, Saturday, April 16
Tuesday, April 19 and 26, rehearsals for Walk for Hunger
program
May 1, Walk for Hunger performance
After that, return to dropin meetings on Tuesdays.
Performing
I can’t get anyone in for free any more, but if you’re at NEFFA on Saturday, please come
play and sing Ravenscroft with us, and bring all your friends.
We have six people signed up for the Walk for Hunger — we
could do with one or two more, especially if they sing bass and/or
play a bass instrument, including recorder. We’ll be doing mostly Ravenscroft
and Holborne,
with a few of our favorite May or Spring songs. I’m only
requiring two rehearsals this year, but if you want to play with
us, you should let me know, and start coming on Tuesdays when you
can make it.
Because the Walk for Hunger program will be piggybacking on the
NEFFA workshop (which has to be accessible to dropins), we can be more liberal about when we turn from a
dropin group into a performing group this year than we have been in the recent past.
We will be spending March and the first part of April largely
working on the repertoire for those two events, but you are
welcome to drop in on Tuesdays at 7:45 PM at my place if you’re interested in that repertoire, even
if you think you won’t be able to make either event.
However, see below.
The last two Tuesdays in April will be rehearsals for the Walk
for Hunger, and restricted to performers in that event.
However, see below.
Walk for Hunger
In order to plan the repertoire for the Walk for Hunger, I do
need to know who is planning to come. Here are the
requirements:
You should be available for the performance, from roughly
noon to 3 PM on Sunday, May 1.
You should be able to make a substantial number of the
Tuesday rehearsals in March and April, and both the April 19 and
the April 26 rehearsals. I’d also really like to schedule an
outdoor, daylight rehearsal, but that’s been difficult in the
past, and will probably continue to be so.
So let me know if you’re interested in playing. It’s probably
the only chance you get to play for an audience in the 10’s of thousands.
LayMusic.org 
